Mandela, Nelson 1918-

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela is South Africa’s iconic elder statesman and winner of the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize. After almost fifty years of antiapartheid activism as a leader in the African National Congress (ANC), including over twenty-seven years in prison (1962–1990), Mandela became South Africa’s first democratically elected president in 1994. Since stepping down from the presidency in 1999, he has continued to play a visible role in South African and international affairs.

Born into the royal Tembu family near Umtata in the Transkei, Mandela attended missionary schools prior to entering Fort Hare University College in 1939. Suspended for participation in student protests in 1940, he moved to Johannesburg, completing a bachelor’s degree through correspondence in 1942. Working and studying part time, he qualified as an attorney through apprenticeship and passage of the qualifying exam in 1952.

His political career began in 1944, when he became a founding member of the Youth League of the ANC. He was prominent in efforts to galvanize the senior ANC to greater militancy that culminated in passage of the Program of Action in 1949. Dropping his opposition to collaboration with communists and Indian nationalists in the wake of their determined opposition to the relentless post-1948 implementation of apartheid, Mandela was at the center of the ANC-led Defiance Campaign (1952–1953), uniting Africans and antiapartheid volunteers of all races and ideological persuasions in nonviolent protest actions. Elected provincial president of the Transvaal ANC and deputy national president of the ANC in 1953, he was banned from political activity by the government and forced to resign. For the remainder of the decade, he concentrated on organizational activities behind the scenes. Only during the long-running treason trial (1956–1961) of 156 ANC members and their non-African allies was Mandela highly visible as lawyer, witness, and spokesman from the dock.

After the defendants in the treason trial were acquitted, Mandela went underground to organize support for unsuccessful mass protests in May 1961. Popularly dubbed the “Black Pimpernel,” surfacing sporadically in South Africa and during a seven-month overseas trip, he evaded arrest and prison for seventeen months. While underground, he participated in clandestine meetings of the ANC (banned in 1960 under the Unlawful Organizations Act in the wake of the Sharpeville massacre) at which the ANC decided to end its policy of nonviolence. Mandela and other leaders of the banned ANC and its also proscribed ally, the Communist Party, then formed a unit called Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) in mid-1961 to conduct sabotage and prepare for eventual guerrilla warfare. In August 1962 Mandela was apprehended by the police in Howick, Natal, and in November 1962 he was sentenced to five years in prison for incitement to strike and leaving the country illegally.

Subsequent to the separate arrest of nine other leaders at the underground Rivonia headquarters of Umkhonto we Sizwe in Johannesburg in July 1963, Mandela was brought from Robben Island prison to face trial with them on charges of sabotage. In the glare of worldwide publicity at the end of the trial, he delivered a dramatic final statement from the dock, concluding that “the ideal of a democratic and free society … is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.”

Receiving a life sentence (instead of the death sentence that could have been passed), Mandela returned to Robben Island and became the world’s most famous political prisoner. Despite South African efforts to black out news about him, the world increasingly became aware of his assertive demands that the government adhere to prison regulations and his leadership of fellow inmates across the political spectrum. Transferred to Pollsmoor prison on the mainland in 1982 and then to a cottage in Victor Verster prison in 1987, Mandela became the star of a deft and media-smart campaign for unconditional release from prison. Simultaneously, he conducted secret talks with government ministers to set the stage for negotiations to achieve majority rule.

Released unconditionally from prison on February 11, 1990, by the newly elected president F. W. de Klerk, Mandela immediately assumed the leadership of the ANC’s negotiations with the Nationalist Party government. Against a backdrop of rising violence, he showed repeated willingness to compromise with former opponents without abandoning the goal of nonracial constitutional democracy based on one person, one vote. In November 1993 an agreement was reached on a constitution, and in December 1993 Mandela and de Klerk were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Victorious at the head of the ANC ticket in the country’s first election open to all citizens, Mandela assumed the presidency of South Africa on May 10, 1994. During his five-year term, he won extraordinary respect at home and abroad for his advocacy and practice of national reconciliation. After completion of his presidency, he turned to international issues, successfully mediating ethnic strife in Burundi. He also spoke out strongly on HIV/AIDS, urging both the South African government and the international community to greater commitment. In June 2004, shortly before his eighty-sixth birthday, he announced his retirement from public life.